


two of a kind

by mayfriend



Category: Batman - All Media Types, DCU (Comics)
Genre: Alfred Pennyworth is the Best, Alpha Bruce Wayne, Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Batfamily (DCU), Beta Alfred Pennyworth, Bruce Wayne is Bad at Communicating, Dick Grayson-centric, Gen, Omega Dick Grayson, Omega Dick Week 2020, Omega Stephanie Brown, discussion of mature topics
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-27
Updated: 2020-07-27
Packaged: 2021-03-06 02:09:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,519
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25555606
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mayfriend/pseuds/mayfriend
Summary: Dick knows it's no one’s fault, but that doesn't make it fair. And he knows the world isn’t fair, heknows, he’s seen it, lived in it, fought for it, but he’d thought that just once he might get a pass. That he might get to be normal, that he might get this one thing, this one thing-But he doesn’t. He doesn’t get shit. He gets suppressants, and lingering looks, and other cops stage-whispering aboutdiversity hires. He gets criminals that think he’s useless, until he puts them on their asses; he gets second-guessed by other heroes,greenheroes, who think they know everything about him from his scent; he gets his own family looking at him like he’s a stranger when he puts the suppressants on, and like he’s an invalid when he throws them out. Even the people that are most sympathetic don’t understand, can’t - betas and alphas all. Omegas don’t end up in their line of work; Dick himself is an aberration, an exception that proves the rule.It’s because he started before he presented, he overhears more than one person say,before anyone knew. Batman starts them too young, warps them.If Dick is warped, then Dick is warped. This is who he is now.
Relationships: Stephanie Brown & Dick Grayson
Comments: 9
Kudos: 211
Collections: Omega!Dick Week





	two of a kind

**Author's Note:**

> Day 1: Discowing, **Omega Mentor** , Breeding

Dick had thought his first heat was the flu initially. It had been going round his school, and the early onset symptoms were practically identical; fever, disorientation, fatigue. Alfred, with his stunted beta nose, had assumed the same; it was only when Bruce came downstairs that he realised this was different. He still remembers how Bruce had strode into the kitchen, or rather, how he froze mid-step. He’d looked at Dick, bleary-eyed and red-cheeked, looked at Alfred, then turned on his heel and locked himself in the Batcave for the entire weekend.

It wasn’t abandonment, not really. It was sensible; first heats were delicate things, and Bruce’s alpha, _Batman’s_ alpha, was stronger than most. He didn’t know how it would react to a new omega, didn’t know if the trust that he and Dick had built up over the past few years would be strong enough to overcome their lack of blood-ties; it’s all very well to call adopted kids part of the family - not that Dick is adopted, but that’s the closest of all mainstream explanations of what he and Bruce are to each other - but in the end, your instincts will supersede your mind. Too many adopted children have mated with unrelated siblings or unbonded parents who weren’t recognised as such by their secondaries; Bruce has been controlling his alpha for most of his life, but this isn’t the day to put that hard-won dominance to the test.

So, it made sense. It made a lot of sense, Dick _understands,_ and yet- Dick doesn’t think he’ll ever be able to forgive him for it. Not completely. Not wholly. The rational mind is one thing, and the hurt, whimpering thing living in his chest is another. 

Bruce- isn’t his dad. Dick had a dad, and he’s dead, and nobody can replace him, but Bruce is his _partner._ He’s meant to stay with him, no matter what. And yet, he’s gone without a word, without an explanation, and Dick is left with Alfred. Alfred who he loves, who he respects, who isn’t Bruce.

Alfred is the one that looks after him, that prepares him, as well as he can. As well as an elderly beta can prepare a scared child for a trial he’s never undergone, for a pain he’s never felt. Bruce couldn’t have done any better, alpha that he is, but Dick would’ve felt better if he’d even tried. It’s humiliating, Alfred telling him he’s going to want to- touch himself, fill himself, maybe even hurt himself. Alfred, seventy-something and old enough to be Dick’s grandfather, and saying the words _slick_ and _knot_ and _slit._

This wasn’t supposed to happen to him. He was meant to be a beta, like his parents, like Alfred. This wasn’t supposed to be his life, and now it’s happening so fast it’s spinning out of control. Some kids- some kids you can just tell are gonna be omega, cause of the way they act. Gentle, and shy, and patient, and all the things Dick isn’t. 

“I’m sorry,” Alfred says, when Dick tries to express as much, the words getting caught in his throat. It’s the last thing he clearly remembers of that day, or the next; the rest of it runs together like melted wax, hot and aching and raw. Alfred is the only one that says he’s sorry.

 _I’m sorry,_ Bruce never says, when it’s all over and Dick feels like leaving his body behind just to get away from the changes in it, when he hands Dick scent suppressants mutely like there’s something shameful in it, when he ups and replaces Dick with a newer model and gives away his mother’s name like it’s nothing. _I’m sorry,_ Jason never says when he presents as an alpha, several years later, and acts like it’s the biggest relief of his life, looking at Dick out the corner of his eye like he’s a cautionary tale. _I’m sorry,_ Alfred says, looking so much older than he is, and Dick doesn’t understand in that moment how rare that is, but he will.

Dick’s aware it doesn’t make sense, just how badly he wants this, needs it. He doesn’t expect anyone to take responsibility for it; he knows it's no one’s fault, the luck of the draw. He knows it’s no one’s fault, but that doesn’t make it fair.And he knows the world isn’t fair, he _knows,_ he’s seen it, lived it, fought for it, but he’d thought that just once he might get a pass. That he might get to be normal, that he might get this one thing, this one thing-

But he doesn’t. He doesn’t get shit. He gets suppressants, and lingering looks, and other cops stage-whispering about _diversity hires._ He gets criminals that think he’s useless, until he puts them on their asses; he gets second-guessed by other heroes, _green_ heroes, who think they know everything about him from his scent; he gets his own family looking at him like he’s a stranger when he puts the suppressants on, and like he’s an invalid when he throws them out. Even the people that are most sympathetic don’t understand, _can’t_ \- betas and alphas all. Omegas don’t end up in their line of work; Dick himself is an aberration, an exception that proves the rule. _It’s because he started before he presented,_ he overhears more than one person say, _before anyone knew. Batman starts them too young, warps them._

If Dick is warped, then Dick is warped. This is who he is now. That doesn’t stop it feeling so fucking lonely.

When she’s fifteen, Stephanie Brown goes into heat for the first time. She’s a late bloomer, something Dick knows will only make it harder. Her mom helps her through it, as Alfred once helped him, and when she comes out of it on the third day, Dick’s waiting on her complex’s roof with doughnuts. He doesn’t know her all that well, not then, but there’s an immediate sense of kinship that hits him like a lightning bolt as she swings her legs over the side of the building, everything about her an open wound, still bleeding. _I was younger than you,_ he thinks, and then _I was never as young as you,_ and then _I wish it was different, I wish the world was different-_

“I’m sorry,” he tells her, and she smiles tiredly at him, the expression a result of habit rather than emotion. Dick wonders if this is what Narcissus felt, staring into that pool of water, so enraptured by his own reflection that he never looked away again; Dick has been on his own for so long that he forgot it hadn't always been this way.

“It's not your fault,” she tells him.

“It's not yours either,” he reminds her, and she tenses, something in her reminiscent of a wind-up toy before her face crumbles. Steph isn't Dick, of course not, but she's enough him that he recognises her.

“I don't know what I'm going to do,” she says, staring out at the city with faraway eyes. “I don't know what I'm going to do.”

Yeah. Dick knows what that's like. Dick knows how that feels.

It feels like- like the first day back at school, and half your friends aren't talking to you anymore, and older students keep on staring at you in the hallways, touching you accidentally-on-purpose in the crush of assembly. Like your careers adviser rolling their eyes when you say you want to go to university, want to be a police officer, want to be more than they think you can be. Like society ladies that are twenty, thirty, forty years older than you pulling you into their circle at fundraisers because omega is _basically_ the same as female, right? and you hate it, but you stay, because they're so much safer than their rich, dead-eyed husbands who look at you like wolves look at rabbits. Like tabloids calling you a slut and a tease and a bad influence on your own family in black and white because you went out for a drink after work, and on page five in the same paper there's a gushing op-ed about how Bruce Wayne, playboy extraordinaire, is really just misunderstood. It feels like staring at yourself in the mirror every morning, compulsively checking for any change in your profile, making sure you'll still pass as a beta if you're careful, if you don't let anyone get too close, if you wear the right clothes and cut your hair short and work twice as hard to get half the respect. _What am I going to do_ , Dick had thought after that first heat, when he'd known things would change but lacked the imagination to understand how much. _What am I going to do?_

“We'll work it out,” Dick tells her, “You don't have to go through this alone.” And then, when that doesn't feel like enough: “I won't let you go through this alone.”

“Okay,” Steph croaks, tears in her eyes that she refuses to let fall, “okay.”

Steph isn't Dick, but that's the whole point. 

**Author's Note:**

> Find me on [twitter](https://twitter.com/_mayfriend_) and on [tumblr](http://mayfriend.tumblr.com/) :)


End file.
